The 2023 presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP), Mr. Peter Obi, has condemned the cancellation of debts owed by the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) to the Federation Account, amounting to ₦5.57 trillion and $1.42 billion, about ₦7.5 trillion, by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
ThelensNG reports that President Tinubu approved the debt write-off last week, as contained in a document prepared by the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC).
Reacting to the development on Wednesday, Obi described the debt cancellation as a betrayal of Nigerians, lamenting that financial recklessness is increasingly becoming normalised in the country.
“A company that recently announced profits and claimed it had turned a new leaf,” he said. “This is the same agency currently facing serious audit inquiries for failing to account for ₦210 trillion, an amount that far exceeds the combined Federal budgets of Nigeria from 2023 to 2026.
“For context, the Federal Government’s budgets for these years were approximately: ₦21.83 trillion for 2023, ₦43.56 trillion for 2024, ₦54.99 trillion for 2025, and an estimated ₦58.18 trillion for 2026. The total budget for these four years amounts to roughly ₦178.56 trillion.”
Obi decried that Nigerians are still awaiting the outcome of the National Assembly’s investigation into the missing trillions. “This company is also under scrutiny for trillions spent on non-functional refineries. Yet, the President, who also serves as the Minister in charge, has approved the write-off of about ₦8 trillion in NNPC debts.”
He noted that Nigerians are already enduring severe hardship resulting from the removal of petroleum and electricity subsidies, with no tangible improvements in their living conditions, and are now confronted with what he described as “unexplained debt forgiveness”.
Obi continued: “The nearly ₦8 trillion write-off will effectively replace revenue that the government is currently seeking through unfair taxation. It is imperative that the government provides a clear and transparent justification for the write-off, given the immense impact such a large amount of resources could have on national development.
“This almost ₦8 trillion write-off could have generated the revenue the government now seeks through these unfair taxes. The amount exceeds the 2025 combined Federal budget allocations for education, health, and agriculture, which total ₦7.1 trillion.”
The former Anambra State governor argued that the funds alone could fully finance critical development sectors and lift millions of Nigerians out of poverty.
He further stated that the write-off sum is almost twice the 2025 Federal Government security budget of ₦4.9 trillion, despite widespread insecurity across communities in the country.
Obi explained that such resources could empower up to eight million youths — representing 10% of Nigeria’s estimated 80 million unemployed population — by creating approximately 1,000 jobs in each of the country’s 8,809 wards, thereby significantly reducing the estimated 130 million Nigerians living in poverty.
“The President, who is also the Minister, owes the Nigerian people clear answers,” he said, stressing that citizens deserve honesty, fiscal discipline, and governance that protects their interests rather than those of mismanaged corporations or political elites.
“This betrayal of the people must be stopped,” he added.
